Thank you for the links. It helped to see how many issues people are facing with SP2 upgrade on SBS 2003, but it did not answer the key question of the best way to recover...Like a manual removal of a failing dll etc.

I re-installed the OS, as the system would not even boot in safe mode.

This guide is intended for migrating Windows 2003 Standard with Exchange 2003 to Windows Small Business Server 2008.
You will need the following:
Exchange Best Practice Analyzer: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=DBAB201F-…

This guide is intended to provide step by step instructions on how to migrate from Small Business Server 2003 to Small Business Server 2011.
NOTE: This guide has been written using the preview version of SBS2011 therefore some of the screens may …